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[quote]Originally posted by Livvie20:
<strong>
I agree he got a bit above himself but he was still doing a fair job imo.
He wasn't that crap or the move wouldn't have come as such a shock.</strong><hr></blockquote>
SAF rated him very highly in the position he wanted him to play, but thought that he was not taking notice of him and was starting to think that he was becoming far too big for his boots. As for the Paul Ince transfer to Inter, SAF has said that during that episode he felt his job was under threat more than at any other time during his tenure at Old Trafford.
For the benefit of those that haven't read it:
[quote]Then was the third and vital need or Paul Ince to make sure that he was always checking the forward runs of either Bakero or Guillermo Amor, leaving Roy Keane to play against the other one. The way Paul was responding to such instructions had been causing me concern. I sensed that he no longer wanted to be the anchorman in midfield, where there was none better at the job. It was clear to me that he now saw himself as an attacking midfield player, which was a hopeless misreading of his strengths. Players who can continually make energy-sapping runs from penalty box to penalty box are rare gems. I had bought Roy Keane to Manchester United because he was one of them, a man whose reserves of stamina put him in the Bryan Robson category. Paul did not have anything like the physical endurance of those two. But to set him in around your back four and there was no quicker or more telling tackler in the game, nobody who could retrieve the ball more effectively when the opposition thought they had made a scoring chance. His strong suit was defending but he refused to embrace that reality. The refusal manifested itself markedly on that unhappy night in Barcelona and, while it would be grossly unfair to apportion overmuch of the blame to Paul, his blurred interpretation of his function did contribute appreciably to our nightmare.<hr></blockquote>
And:
[quote]The decision to sell Paul Ince was mine alone and nobody at Old Trafford was inclined to let me forget the fact. There was nothing splendid about my isolation as our supporters reacted angrily to the jettisoning of a player they saw as a vital contributor to our recent success. I agreed wholeheartedly with that assessment but felt I had to act on my conviction that the fundamental change in Paul's attitude, his insistence on trying to assume a role in the team for which he was not equipped, had diminished his usefulness to us to the point where a transfer made absolute sense.<hr></blockquote>
And:
[quote]Yet, in spite of it all, I was being branded as Public Enemy Number One for driving him away. I was out on my own, with no hint of support from the corridors of Old Trafford, and the people who keep queueing up for jobs as managers of football clubs should consider the vulnerability I felt then.<hr></blockquote>
So, the fact that Alex disliked him is not true, he held him in high regard for what he wanted him for, and only decided to get rid of him when it was obvious that Paul's attitude was not correct.
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